NAACP launches new strategy to fight HIV

Group using Houston churches to mobilize black community

Updated 10:49 pm, Saturday, July 7, 2012

Pastor Timothy Sloan, shown at Humble's St. Luke Missionary Baptist Church last year, plans to take an HIV test in front of his congregation on Sunday to push HIV awareness in the black community.

Pastor Timothy Sloan, shown at Humble's St. Luke Missionary Baptist Church last year, plans to take an HIV test in front of his congregation on Sunday to push HIV awareness in the black community.

Photo: Jerry Baker, Freelance

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Mitzi Henderson of Houston prepares to start the NAACP National Convention Bike Ride at Discovery Green. The convention began Saturday.

Mitzi Henderson of Houston prepares to start the NAACP National Convention Bike Ride at Discovery Green. The convention began Saturday.

Photo: Melissa Phillip

NAACP launches new strategy to fight HIV

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Voting access is at the top of the agenda as NAACP leaders and delegates converge on Houston this weekend, but the signature program unveiled at the 103rd annual convention this week involves health.

On Sunday, the organization releases "The Black Church and HIV: The Social Justice Imperative" to address a startling reality: One in 16 African-American men and one in 32 black women will be diagnosed with HIV in their lifetimes, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The nation's oldest and largest civil rights organization will join Houston churches for the first NAACP national "Day of Unity," in which faith leaders preach about HIV as a social justice issue. Congregants of St. Luke Missionary Baptist Church in Humble will watch their pastor, the Rev. Timothy Sloan, take an HIV test at the 10 a.m. service Sunday and testing also will be offered at the church for the first time.

There's power in having the "devastating impact of the disease actively addressed from the pulpit," said NAACP's chairman of the board, Roslyn Brock, a health policy expert and health activist.

"The African-American church is one of the - if not the - most significant institutions that we own in our community. It is the moral authority and it is in many respects the voice of the voiceless and those who are left out," Brock added. "We have to say it's time to stop and get tested and tell the truth about this disease. We're living in silence and dying in silence. We need to talk about this issue today and not tomorrow."

According to the CDC, roughly 20 percent of 1. 2 million U.S. residents living with the virus are not aware of their status.

In Texas, HIV continues to disproportionately affect people of African descent as well as gay and bisexual males, according to the Texas Department of State Health Services. Of the 4,242 Texans diagnosed in 2010, 42 percent were black, 31 percent were Hispanic and 25 percent were Anglo. More than half of Texans living with the virus received HIV through male-to-male sexual contact.

Houston is considered one the nation's HIV/AIDS "hot spots." About 22,000 people with HIV live in the greater Houston area.

Among Texas cities, Houston, the state's largest, had the most HIV and AIDS diagnoses in 2010. Harris County ranked No. 1 among counties for new HIV infections, AIDS cases and people living with HIV while having the second-highest HIV case rate behind Dallas County.

Health is one of five focus areas in the NAACP's new strategic plan, but it has been on the national agenda for decades.

Other health initiatives

When restraint of trade issues prevented black physicians from practicing in hospitals, the organization supported the Hill-Burton Act, a 1946 law which forbade medical facilities that received certain federal funds from discriminating - though separate but equal facilities were once allowed.

The NAACP adopted health as a civil rights issue in its constitution in the mid-1980s, Brock said.

The NAACP also supported the full implementation of the Affordable Care Act because "access to quality, affordable health care is a civil and human right," according to a statement released after the U.S. Supreme Court decision.